Who Knows?
- From just a tiny egg
- A larva will eclose
- And turn and eat its shell --
- Its first meal as it grows.
- Then on its host it chews
- A day or three -- who knows?
- And spins a sticky silk
- And there its old skin goes.
- This sloughed off skin it eats --
- Recycling apropos;
- Most growth comes soon aft molt --
- When skin is soft disposed.
- And three more times it molts;*
- It just out eats its clothes.
- From speck to near 2-inch,
- Then leaves the host imposed.
- Now it moves "far" and "fast" --
- To pupate where? -- Who knows?
- And spins a sticky mat
- To where its hind legs go.
- Half-a-day larva hang,
- And in a "J" reposed,
- Then drop into an "I"
- To molt -- and too transpose.
- A camouflaged pupa,
- And lime-green now exposed;
- A dozen days it hangs,
- And then a darkening shows.
- The cuticle now splits --
- And this is called eclose;
- The stomach rotates out,
- And then the monarch grows.
- The blood expands the wings,
- Which pump now rather slow,
- And when the monarch's dry --
- It flies, to where? Who knows?
- G. Kittell
2007
* not counting pupation